Weight plateau?

I'm not an expert and I don't understand how this works because in my head I'm thinking eat less excercise more = weight loss.
So was amazed at eating and losing weight but I walk a lot. I plateaued for about 2 months and I got some really good advice I upped my calories by a hundred a day to 1300 had a massive eat feast in London one day and added a different type of excercise which you will laugh at was housework ( a friend asked me to do two hours cleaning a week) initially I put on a pound the first week I panicked got some more scientific advice and was encouraged to stick with it, the following week I lost that one pound the next week 3 pound. So I broke the plateau, my diary is open but I eat so much sugary stuff and am not a very clean eater.
That's what broke my plateau within two weeks. When I hit another wall I will do the same and maybe cut a walk out to be honest I don't want to be walking a marathon every week and eating 1300 cals to maintain when I hit my target. I do have a sedentary job which is walk to the end of the garden pick up the phone. Also if you find you put on weight at the beginning put in the search bar about glycogen and that will explain why that has happened and will encourage you to stick with it.

There are multiple ways to break thru the plateau. Before I mention it here are a few things you need to get right. Make sure your macro nutrients are in the right proportions. For me, to loose weight I have 50 percent of my calories as protein, 40 percent carbs, and 10 percent fats. The carbs mostly consist of vegetables and I will throw in yams or quinoa if I need the extra energy.

They say whole wheat is good for you. That is not true. It turns into simple sugars and increases your insulin levels. Keep with the low glycemic foods. Anything below 50 you can use. Also, stay away from any food products that have soy. It messes with your metabolism in a bad way.

Now here are some other things to not do. Do not eat too little food. You will put your body into starvation mode and you will only make things worse. Make sure you are keeping approximately a 500 to 600 calorie deficit every day. Also, don't eat a few large meals a day. Space them out, I eat 7 to 8 small meals a day every 2 to 3 hours. Constantly feeding your body will keep your metabolism at a steady pace. You have to eat to loose weight. DO NOT UNDER EAT!!!!! If you are not loosing still cut back a little on the carbs or swap the starchy carbs for vegetables.

Lastly you need to exercise. When you do weights your metabolism can stay higher for as long as 36 hours than if you just did cardio. I cannot emphasize enough you NEED to do weight bearing exercise. And I don't mean just go thru the motions. You need to be breaking a sweat while doing weights. I would recommend using a trainer to get started. and Lastly if you want to do cardio, only do 20 minutes worth of H.I.T. (High intensity training). I will either do sprints on the treadmill or use a weighted barbell, and at times jump rope. Long steady state cardio does more harm than good. Short high intensity cardio burns fat like no other. But I will re iterate YOU HAVE TO EAT!!!! 80% of your weight loss is in the right diet. If you don't follow that you are only making things worse.

To give my background. I am Hypothyroid and have been struggling with weight all my life. I have tried every diet and workout out there. I was as high as 215 putting me in the obese category. I did only cardio for a while and cut back on my food and I lost weight but at the expense of loosing muscle as well, which only made things worse because I lost muscle to burn fat and I didn't loose anything more. I cut back my food more and i just ruined my metabolism even worse. After doing a lot of reading I changed my diet and ate more and changed to the weights and H.I.T cardio and I went all the way down to 160 lbs. I lost 55 lbs but also I lost a good chunck of muscle also. So I didn't change my workout at all and just changed my diet and I gained 20 lbs of pure muscle. I have kept the weight off over 2 years now and I am putting on more muscle. What I have seen is the more muscle you have the easier it is to keep the weight off.

Hope this helped

I have some before and after photos at

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/we-mirin-vol-26-19-unreal-physiques.html

I am number three (Dylanss)

Well 700 to 1100 calories left over is a high deficit. When one diets, metabolism slows automatically. Eating less than required calories slows it even more. Eat more.

A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness industry for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

"I am only down to 164"

You are doing wonderfully! What an accomplishment!

Those of you on plateau, have you been tracking your body fat %? You might be losing weight and gaining muscle making it appear that all your work is ineffective when you are actually building a much healthier body. I would be careful about just eating less. If you are severely under your caloric intake your body could be entering starvation mode and reducing metabolism. This article was interesting and might help you out:
http://voices.yahoo.com/starvation-mode-dispelling-myths-2900886.html

Ask yourself some questions: Are you feeling generally better or worse? Are you more energized or more tired? Do you feel weaker or stronger?

Are you tracking properly?
If you are under eating sure your metabolism slows but not enough to stop weight loss altogether. Your over estimating exercise or under estimating food
I had an eating disorder and starved myself to 500cals a day and lost weight, all that about plateauing cause not eating enough is bull IMO.
Unless you've eaten nothing for like a year and you have no fat on you, only then might this be true.

I finally broke my plateau just last week. I had gone over 2 months with no weight loss. I re did my goals on here. I was very specific on the amount of exercise I was doing. I try to exercise 5-6 days a week for an hour. I also changed my type of exercise. It was hard for me to understand that I didn't have to sweet on the treadmill anymore to loos what I wanted. I started using the app Jetfit and setting daily work out routines. I still do atleast 15 mins of cardio most days. Thanks to MFP I have learned that you have to "trick" your body when it comes to the exercises. I know the not loosing weight is very frustrating. But you just have to tweek your calorie intake and exercises. Good luck.

If you've been in a plateau for 4-5 weeks, you're eating too much, end.

You did see the bit where the op said they had 700+ calories left each day? Unless they are severely overestimating their exercise burn or underestimating what they eat, I don't think they are eating too much!

If you've been in a plateau for 4-5 weeks, you're eating too much, end.

Rubbish.
Unless of course our TDEE's are under 1200 which would mean we're not only extremely unlucky but we're also incredibly rare!

but does this apply to women also?? Men do lose weight faster.